Google open sources Zygote 3D human body viewer

Google Body has open sourced the enjoyable to use 3D visualisation of the human body built by Google labs engineers in their “20% time”, the fuzzily-measured time slot employees are allowed to use to work on personally inspired creative projects.

The open sourcing of this code is a result of the Google Labs division being closed last year. The code now sits with Zygote Media Group, who provided the imagery for Google Body in the first place.

Popular with teachers and students looking at human anatomy, 3D representations of both a male and a female “specimen” are now accessible at http://www.zygotebody.com

Users will need to employ a WebGL compliant browser and the latest versions of Firefox and Google Chrome are certainly your best options here — no additional software needs to be installed.

According to the Google open source blog, “Zygote Body offers the same navigation, layering and instant search as Google Body.”

Users can zoom in and out of both the male and female forms and peel back anatomical layers. There are also options to search for and identify, muscles, organs and bones around the torso.

Although Microsoft has said that it will not support the WebGL graphics spec, this does seem to be an incredibly good example of why the good folks at Redmond may have got it wrong.